Rate My Professor David McCarthy

Dr. David McCarthy serves as Professor and Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Waterborne Pathogens: Surveillance, Prediction and Mitigation in the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of Guelph. He earned his PhD in Environmental Engineering from Monash University in 2009 with a thesis on 'Modelling microorganisms in Urban Stormwater,' a Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) majoring in Civil Engineering (water) in 2005, and a Bachelor of Science majoring in mathematics and physics in 2004, both from Monash University. Prior to joining the University of Guelph in 2023, supported by $8 million in federal funding over eight years, he held positions including at Monash University and serves as Adjunct Professor at Queensland University of Technology. He has supervised 27 PhD students and 3 Masters students to completion, earning the 2012 Monash Postgraduate Supervisor of the Year Award.

Dr. McCarthy's research focuses on biosurveillance of pathogens in urban water systems, health-related water microbiology, risk assessments, pathogen fate and transport, urban hydrology, stormwater management, green water treatment technologies, and novel IoT devices for monitoring and sampling water quality. He has received the 2021 Vice Chancellor's Award for Research Impact, Dean's Awards for Research Impact and Research Enterprise, 2021 Mid-Career Award from the Joint Committee on Urban Drainage, 2014 Young Tall Poppy Science Award, 2014 Victoria Fellow, 2014 Early Career Alumni Award for the Faculty of Engineering, 2014 Trevithick Prize, and 2009 Winston Churchill Fellowship. As Executive Editor for Water Research and Associate Editor for Water, Water Quality Research Journal, and Blue Green Systems, he previously chaired the Joint Committee on Urban Drainage and participates in international research committees. Key publications include 'Passive Sampling of SARS-CoV-2 for Wastewater Surveillance' (Environmental Science & Technology, 2021), 'Monitoring of diverse enteric pathogens across environmental and host reservoirs with TaqMan array cards and standard qPCR' (The Lancet Planetary Health, 2021), 'Source tracking using microbial community fingerprints: Method comparison with hydrodynamic modelling' (Water Research, 2017), and 'Electrochemical oxidation for stormwater disinfection' (Chemosphere, 2018). His developments, such as a 3D-printed passive sampler for SARS-CoV-2 deployed over 40,000 times worldwide, have shaped urban water management practices and informed policy for governments and farming organizations.